


Keep Smiling Through

by Lasgalendil



Series: It's Been A Long, Long Time [4]
Category: Agent Carter (TV), Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Awesome Peggy Carter, BAMF Peggy, Captain America: The First Avenger, F/M, Gay Bucky Barnes, HYDRA Trash Party, Homophobia, Homophobic Language, Hurt/Comfort, Hydra make a big mistake, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, One-Sided Relationship, Peggy takes no prisoners, Sexual Abuse, Sexual Violence, Steggy - Freeform, Stucky - Freeform, World War II, the Howling Commandos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-12
Updated: 2015-12-13
Packaged: 2018-05-06 09:49:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 4
Words: 3,635
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5412296
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lasgalendil/pseuds/Lasgalendil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Behind enemy lines, a covert operation by the Howling Commandos goes awry. Captain America's fate is unknown. Peggy Carter and Bucky are taken prisoner. Peggy knows the truth about Austria.</p><p>...and she'll be damned if she lets it happen again.<br/>Or, HYDRA will be sorry they ever messed with Steve's best girl--and boy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Between You and the World](https://archiveofourown.org/works/5402330) by [MilesHibernus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MilesHibernus/pseuds/MilesHibernus). 



> Keep smiling through  
> Just like you always do  
> 'Till the blue skies drive the dark clouds far away  
> —Keep Smiling Through, 1939

“Sergeant Barnes.”  
He knew that voice.  
“Sergeant Barnes, wake up.”  
Knew it from somewhere.  
  
There were hands. Hands touching him. Ruffling through his hair, pressing his hands, light lips on fingers. Small hands. Gentle hands. So small, so soft, like _Stevie’s_ —  
  
“Stevie?” he asked groggily.  
  
He opened his eyes. The world snapped to. This wasn’t their apartment, this wasn’t Stevie—  
  
Stevie didn’t exist anymore. Stevie was a skinny boy from Brooklyn. Stevie was gone. Captain America had taken his place. This wasn’t Brooklyn. This was War.  
  
…And suddenly he remembered.  
  
“The fuck—“ Bucky gasped, lashing out against nightmares and darkness. The factory. In Austria. “Gerroffme!”  
  
“Sergeant Barnes it’s me, it’s Peggy Carter—“  
  
“No!” Someone was screaming. “No!”  
  
Hands. More hands. Pinning him. Holding him down as he thrashed. They were going to—Oh, God, they were going to—  
  
“James—James Barnes, listen to me!”  
  
He bit. Deep. The hands holding him released immediately, a sharp cry of “shit!”  
  
“For God’s sake, _Bucky!_ ”  
  
He stopped. Shivered. Bucky. Bucky was the name Stevie’d called him. It was enough to bring him back.  
  
“You know, I’ve never truly understood that nickname,” a woman’s low voice said. “But in this instance, I am grateful.”  
  
“C-Carter?” he couldn’t get the words out. His lips were dry, his tongue tasted like ashes.  
  
“The one, the only.”  
  
“Where—Steve. Where’s Steve!” he forced himself to sit.  
“Captain Roger’s location is unknown, I’m afraid. Even to me.”  
“Do they have him. Carter, do they have him!”  
“No. I think not.”  
“What makes you so sure?”  
Carter brought his hand to her face. Blood. Dried blood. Her lips were split and her nose broken. She winced as his fingers brushed her cheek. If he could see, she’d have a hell of a shiner.  
“He’s going to kill them,” Bucky breathed. “He’s going to kill them—“  
“He won’t get the chance,” Carter said forcefully. “I may only be a woman, but I am perfectly capable of killing them myself.”  
“You talk a lot of shit, Carter.”  
“As do you.”  
  
“So Stevie—Cap—got out alright?”  
“I believe so.”  
“Does he—“  
“Believe us dead?” Carter sighed. “Likely.”  
“Good,” Bucky panted. “Good.”  
“Sergeant Barnes?”  
“That way the fucking idiot won’t come looking for us. Get himself killed.”  
“I fear there is little hope in that.”  
“Phillips would never let him.”  
“He’s _Steve Rogers_ ,” Carter chided, “If he believed for even a moment there was the smallest chance you were alive, he’d move hell itself to save you.”  
Bucky chewed his tongue. Didn’t like her tone. What she was implying. “Steve’s no fairy.”  
“Oh, good Lord, you men. Did Steve never tell you?”  
“He was ordered to find the 107th—“  
“Bloody hell. You’re as oblivious as he is.”  
“What? He was commended—“  
“He’s Captain bloody America. They couldn’t bloody well court-martial him, could they? So if he got the absolutely stupid idea to blunder his way behind enemy lines to find his best friend, do you really think a man like Phillips—or God himself—could stop him?”  
“He really did that?”  
“Yes.”  
“Wait—how’d he even know?”  
“Well. I suppose someone must’ve told him.”  
“Carter?”  
“Sergeant?”  
“I like you even less.”  
“I—well, Steve—saved your bloody life. You’re welcome.”  
“You risked my friend’s life, and you expect me to thank you?”  
“I saved your friend’s life. He was going to go it alone by foot—or worse, motorbike. I’m the one who got him a ride from Howard.” Howard. Howard Stark. The genius inventor who fucked both queers and dames and didn’t give a damn what the world thought, who looked at Steve—  
  
Bucky added Howard to the list of people he’d gladly kill. Somewhere under Zola, all of Austria, and Adolf Hitler. “I still don’t like you.”  
  
“Well, it can’t be helped,” he heard Carter sigh. “Now sit. You’re going to drink.”  
  
Damn, but the water felt good on his parched tongue, chapped lips. He let out a needy gasp as she drew the canteen away.

  
[God. The sound of it. It was just _indecent_.]  
[Like the sounds they’d dragged out of him—]  
[He hadn’t meant to come, get so undone—]

  
“Slowly, or you’ll spit it all up again,” she warned.  
But the water wasn’t the only reason he was retching.

* * *

K rations. A couple canteens. A single straw pallet to sleep on.  
  
And Carter—that bitch—insisted he take it. There wasn’t any reason, she’d sniffed, for them to both sleep on the cold floor, and she wasn’t moving so would he just bloody man up and take it because she would be damned if she slept in comfort while an injured soldier suffered so just shut up and bloody take it _before I make you_.  
  
And Carter, being Carter, most certainly would.

* * *

 

“Where are we?” Bucky asked.  
“No idea.”  
“How long have we been?”  
“Not a bloody clue.”  
“What _do_ you know?”  
“It’s been silent. Too quiet. No wind, rain, nothing. I hazard a guess we’re underground.”  
“You get a look at the place?”  
“They had me blindfolded. There was a hall, roughly twenty paces. Turned left. Up some stairs—twelve. Turned Left. A door, there were keys. Another hall, fifty paces, a kitchen, dining hall, could hear, could smell, then a door. Keys. Another room. That was where—“  
His gut clenched. “They do anything else to you?”  
“Not as of yet,” Carter said, steel in her voice. “But I was told to expect it. They wanted you awake, I was told. I hazard a guess they’ll make you watch.”  
“Fuck,” Bucky spat.  
“Yes, quite.”  
Silence. “It—“  
“Yes?”  
“It’ll go easier. Be over faster if you just let them.”  
“Sergeant Barnes, I am no whore. If a man wishes to fuck me, he will have to do better than a gun to my head.” Then, gentler, kinder. “Flowers, at the very least. I am also particularly fond of pearls. Tell Steve for me, won’t you?”  
“Carter—for the love of God—just let them.”  
“Did you?” she snapped.  
And the answer was no, no of course not, he took it like a man, went down fighting, made them pay for every time they touched him…  
  
Until—  
  
Until he was too sick, too weak, too broken to fight back. And then yes, yes he lay there like some fucking fairy, some goddamned dame and let them take him. _And this, this,_ he heard his mother’s voice, _was the sort of thing a wicked little boy could expect if he went around and let boys touch him._  
  
…and he liked it. Fuck, but he’d _liked_ it, it’d been years since he’d felt safe enough for a proper fuck with another man instead of the awkward fumbling among the Army camps, scared shitless he’d be caught, he’d be court-martialled. It’d been since Brooklyn even, since sneaking off for a good lay, lying to Stevie he’d been out all night with yet another girl when he was just too ashamed—  
  
“Of course not!” His face flushed as his voice cracked. It was dark. Carter couldn’t see, wouldn’t know. But his heart was too loud in his chest. His voice too shaky. He’d taken too long to answer. And she _knew_ , damnit. She just knew.  
  
He expected laughter. Disgust. Anger. That she’d call him a fucking queer, a goddamned fairy, that she’d spill everything to Steve, how he felt about him, how he could only stand it, only choke down the tears and semen if he imagined it was Steve holding him, Steve fucking him, Steve’s strong hands in his hair, fingers up his ass—  
  
“Did you know,” Carter said softly, “that I joined the SSR because I believed in the war effort. I thought that my life, in the span of things, wasn’t much to lose if it meant we’d all be safe. But death—well, if you die, you simply stop. The war goes on without you. I think what you gave—what they took from you—is far the greater sacrifice.”  
  
Bucky Barnes hadn’t meant to cry. But he sobbed anyways into a pallet of straw, wept until his tears ran dry and his throat was fucking raw and sore as if those bastards had had another go. “Fuck you, Carter,” he choked as she handed him the canteen.  
  
“You’re welcome. Now come on, then. Drink some more. Eat. I’ve got a plan.”


	2. Chapter 2

Stale food. Stale water. Several hours—or was it days? years?—of fitful, feverish sleep on  a stale, moldy straw mattress. Bucky Barnes awoke gasping, disoriented.  
  
“Carter?” he called.  
“I’m here.”  
  
He shivered. It was cold. Cold and dank. He swore he could feel the lice and fleas crawling against him.  
  
“You had the nightmares again,” Carter stated, as if it was nothing to be ashamed of, as if he didn’t have them because he’d let some fucking Nazis take him, take everything from him. At least he hadn’t pissed the bed, something that had only added more shame to his sin in the previous weeks. “You were calling out for Ste—Captain Rogers.”  
  
So she’d heard him, then, heard him bawling for Stevie. Fuck. It was one thing for Carter to know, know about him, it was another to have known she’d actually seen it.   
  
He was grateful. Grateful as much as he hated her.   
  
“Here,” he heard her approach, the rustle of her hair and steady hum of her breath. “Drink.”   
He batted her hands away, took the canteen impatiently. He didn’t like touch. Not anymore. Not since—  
  
And her hands were too small, damnit. Too soft. Too much like Stevie’s. And fuck but he was not going to cry like a goddamned kid again. Not in front of her.  
  
He heard her scrounging among the K rations. How the hell the Germans got their hands on them—  
  
Oh, right. Their own rations. The Third Reich had always been so damned utilitarian.   
  
“Here we are,” Carter had returned. He heard the unmistakable sound of cellophane, the bitter-sweet smell of chocolate, and his mouth was suddenly filled with drool and his stomach rumbled.  
  
“We should save those. The D rations. For emergencies.”  
“Or escape, yes,” but she pushed it into his hands anyways. “But you threw up everything last night, and you’re no use to me half-dead. This will go down easier. Hopefully stay there.”  
“Steve’ll come for us,” it slipped out. Slipped out between greedy bites of sweet, sticky chocolate. He felt a flush creep up his cheeks.  Didn’t know why he said that.  
“For you, quite. Captain Rogers knows I am perfectly capable of handling myself.”  
“Meaning I’m not.”  
“Meaning from the moment I’ve met him he’s talked about you in the same awe-struck manner a small child might describe his dog. It isn’t a question of capacity, Sergeant Barnes. He loves you. In his own way.”  
“So what? You’re his sweetheart and I’m the _puppy_?” God, but he was bitter. And the worst part was he’d _seen_ it, seen it with his own eyes, the way Stevie looked at him now. It wasn’t for protection. Stevie was watching after him, worrying for him. It was everything Bucky, everything Stevie wasn’t. Had never been. It was enough to make him cry.  
“Sweethearts come and go, but little boys never forget their dogs,” she said. “If it’s of any help.”  
“Carter?”  
“Sergeant Barnes?”  
“Shut the fuck up.”  
  
She did. Let him eat the rest of his chocolate in morose silence. But the moment he was done she pressed another into his hands wordlessly.  
“I ain’t wasting food.”  
“You haven’t eaten in days.”  
“Days? That how long you think we’ve been down here?”  
“Steve may be an oblivious idiot, I am not. He thinks he has his best friend back. I admire you the facade—am grateful, even—but you are not well. I will not allow your health to jeopardize this mission.”  
Mission. Objectives. It was the military training in him. At this point he was barely a functioning human being, but just not having to think, to fear, simply following orders…it would be a welcome release. “And what’s that?”  
“Oh, how do you Americans say it? Raise Hell.”  
  



	3. Chapter 3

The cell was small, cold, dank. They’d run hands over every inch, testing, feeling, sounding. All brick. Not a scrap of mortar out of place. The ceiling was more difficult, with Carter perched precariously—scandalously—on his shoulders, made him feel uncomfortable to have her body so near his face. But once she stood on her tiny feet—how could girls balance on such small feet, anyways?—the panic subsided.   
  
“No luck,” Carter sighed. “Bring me down.”  
The ceiling was solid, no ventilation she could find. The floor was stone. The steel door was set to open inwards, a small sliver of light beckoning from the hall outside. Bucky could smell the oil from the hinges. Their cage was well-maintained.  
  
…Fuck Nazis.  
  
Still. Carter waited by the door. Watching. Listening. Counting footsteps. While he was out she’d already determined there was a patrol every (what she estimated without a watch) fifteen minutes. Two men—or women. The Third Reich, she had stared bitterly on more than one occasion, was far more lenient with the role a woman could play in war. She could even differentiate footsteps, having worked out at least eight individual guards by their pacing and weight alone.  
  
Peggy Carter was the definition of meticulousness. She drove him crazy. She made him count and recount the K rations. Take inventory. They had two canteens, food for seven days at three meals each. She made him open each one, take stock of matches, chocolates, gum. Even the cigarettes, which, being English, she referred to quite calmly as ‘fags’.  
  
“You know the first time I heard that word over here I nearly punched a guy.”  
“Only nearly?” Carter attempted humor.  
  
“It means something else back home.” He wanted to light one. Wanted a smoke so badly. But Carter was right—they should save the matches.  
  
Still. He rolled it in his fingers, let the familiar feel fall down his hands. Put it between his lips, enjoyed the comforting sensation, the taste, the rich, earthy smell. Closed his eyes, closed his eyes and took a deep, long drag.  
  
He lost track of time. Himself. When he came to, he felt Carter’s eyes boring holes in him through the dark.   
  
“I didn’t know you smoked, Sergeant Barnes,” she stated, matter-of-factly.  
“Didn’t used to. Couldn’t. Not with—“ he almost said Stevie. “Steve. His asthma. Just coming home from the bars smelling like it was bad enough to set him off.”  
“Well. War brings out the rudeness in us all.”  
“What’s yours?”  
“I dearly love punching things.”  
“What,” he rolled to face her in the dark. “Classy dame like you, lose her cool?”  
“I know. Not only am I a woman, I’m _English_. I ought to be expatriated for that alone.”  
  
“Well, I’m a sexual deviant. Your secret’s safe with me.”  
She made a noise then. Not sure. “I will endeavor to call them cigarettes.”  
“Call them what the fuck you want. Call _me_ that, and I’ll punch you. Dame or no.”  
“Even Steve’s girl?” she tried again for humor.  
“Especially Steve’s girl. I ain’t going to let him marry some girl who’s no good for him.”  
“Marriage, is it?”  
“It’s what people do,” he said. Then, almost an afterthought, “When they can.”  
“I don’t mean to hurt you,” Carter offered. “ _He_ doesn’t mean to hurt you.”  
As apologies go, it was sincere enough. Bucky only shrugged. Took another drag on that unlit cigarette. “There’s a gym. Boxing gym in Brooklyn. Tried to train Stevie when we both decided to enlist. You’d like it there. He should take you.” As apologies go, it wasn’t the nicest, but there you have it. They were even.  
“I'd be delighted.”  
“Enough small talk. It’s time you told me about that plan of yours.”  
“It’s not much of a plan.”  
“How much not a plan?”  
“Perhaps ten percent of a plan. The rest we’ll have to improvise.”  
“Well, shucks, darlin’. It’s a good thing we’re the Howling Commandos.”  
“Quite.” That might’ve been a laugh.  
“So Carter, isn’t about time you told me about that ten percent of a plan of yours?”


	4. Chapter 4

It was a truth universally recognized that a female combatant within an enemy’s encampment was at considerable risk for a rape. It was so common, Peggy knew, as to be expected. There had been—briefings. On this sort of thing.  
  
Don’t struggle.  
Pretend to enjoy it.  
It will be over soon.

  
 _Lie back_ , she thought bitterly, _and think of England._  
  
Peggy was no fool. She’d known the risks, known the risks and joined the SSR anyways. Oh, she’d broken a few faces and fingers for unwanted leering and groping on both sides of the Atlantic. She’s been called doll and darling, underestimated, underused, unappreciated. And she’d gone with the Howling Commandos, with Steve’s ragtag band of the 107th and sundry, alone with a group of men, starved for female companionship, and she felt their stares. They were friends, treated her with the utmost respect…but still. The fact she was a woman among men never quite escaped her completely.  
  
Peggy Carter was used to danger. But she’d never faced this.  
  
She would be damaged, she told herself, afterwards. In pain. Emotionally compromised. If she and Barnes were to escape—well. She would need to keep her head together now. Plan and assist with reconnaissance while she could.  
  
She wasn’t important. She was expendable. Even damaged and sickly Barnes was faster, stronger, and more experienced in the field. Peggy Carter prided herself in her combat skills, both hand-to-hand and marksmanship, but Barnes put her efforts to shame. Barnes was a man, and she simply was not. Peggy could provide logistics, even firepower if they were able to procure some weapons…but the bulk of their escape would be up to him.  
  
 _If I can’t walk, he will carry me._ It never occurred to her he wouldn’t, that he might run for safety and leave her behind.   
  
She didn’t know Barnes. Not well. Not really.

And the more she learned, the more she wondered if anyone truly did. Certainly not the WACs he’d danced with in London, laughing and stealing kisses. Not the many soldiers British, French, and Yankee with whom he’d had anonymous encounters, fearing discovery yet unable to stop himself from that irrepressible relief. Not the 107th who commended him for his bravery and respected his skill as a leader and soldier. Not Phillips. And certainly not Steve.  
  
Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes wasn’t the boyhood hero Steve idolized, no one—not even Steve Rogers himself—was that perfect. She’d prepared herself for that, knowing all of Steve’s stories, Steve’s perceptions were only one man’s painting—and artist as he was, the portrait he’d created was incomplete. Still. She’d been surprised by how much so. The Barnes she met after the rescue in Austria was bitter, distant, and looked at her with such unbridled rage—resignation? that she found their interactions uncomfortable. But Steve…when he was with Steve, looking at Steve, his face had softened, the lines disappeared. Those dead, hollowed eyes lit up, a look of sadness, longing and joy. And it had taken her—not long, but longer than she should have needed—to realize.   
  
James Barnes was a queer.  
  
Barnes was in love with Steve Rogers. He had been for years. And the shock she’d felt watching Steve transform before her eyes must be nothing, nothing compared to his own. The small boy had become a man overnight, and whatever feelings he may have been able to hide from Steve, the world—perhaps even himself—were coming at last to light.   
  
A foreign country. Continent, even. At war. Risking his life, and any moment, any wrong move, any misstep, and James Barnes could be imprisoned. Court-martialed. James Barnes could lose his best friend, his uniform, perhaps even his life. She’d be willing to guess even if Steve knew, if Steve said nothing, not all the Howling Commandos would be so accepting. Dugan had some unkind things about— _them_. Queers, queens, homosexuals. The sort of things that all men are trained to say to make themselves feel more like men.  But Philips? Philips, the War Effort, the USO, the grand circus of publicity and propaganda that surrounded Captain America would never allow their image of these heroes to be tainted.   
  
Oh, the comic had turned her into a simple (not _simple,_ Peggy chided herself, it was honorable and desperately important work for those who served) nurse, Cap’s simpleton sweetheart who remained behind on missions or was kidnapped repeatedly by the enemy only to be saved as a woman ought. And Barnes? Well. Barnes had been transformed from the battle-weary veteran, best friend, and queer he was into a _child_. Bucky Barnes, Cap’s plucky young sidekick, was a household name. It was easier, she supposed, to frame that mutual devotion so obvious even on screen in a parental way than to explain the actual truth.   
  
Barnes was a soldier. Barnes was Steve’s friend. Barnes had been through hell, had sobbed his eyes out in front of her, sick and wretched, Barnes had had sexual encounters—far too numerous to count, she supposed—with other men, Barnes was a queer, Barnes felt the same way about Steve Rogers as she did, and she knew she was meant to feel disgust…but the feeling Peggy had was more akin to pity. Even _respect._  
  
James Barnes was broken. Perhaps irreparably so.   
  
…But he was no coward.  
  
“What, Sergeant, is your opinion on explosives?”  
There was a low chuckle in the darkness, the sound of an unlit cigarette being pulled from between his teeth. “I like the way you think.”  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "Lie back and think of England"-phrase first used in 1912 to describe a woman's place in unwanted sexual experiences within marriage. Because misogyny is for everyone! http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/LieBackAndThinkOfEngland


End file.
